Prince Andrea Casiraghi Engaged to Socialite Tatiana Santo Domingo

Princess Caroline of Monaco has announced the engagement of her eldest son Andrea to his girlfriend of 7 years, Heiress Tatiana Santo Domingo.

Monaco can expect another lavish wedding next year, Princess Caroline, 55, has confirmed that her eldest son will wed his long-term girlfriend. “I have the joy to announce the engagement of my son Andrea Casiraghi to Miss Tatiana Santo Domingo,” The Princess says in a statement released by her press office. It was signed Her Royal Highness, the Princess of Hanover (Caroline is married to Prince Ernst of Hanover).

The newly engaged couple met through mutual friends while studying at a lycée in Fontainebleau, near Paris. Andrea is the first of the late Princess Grace‘s grandchildren to be set to wed. No date has been set for the royal wedding but it is understood it will take place next year.

Then the eyes of the world were on the principality as fireworks, concerts, and not one but two wedding ceremonies took place, gilded by the presence of European royals.

Given the impressive pedigree shared by the Monegasque golden boy and his high society fiancée, glamour will certainly be feature again.

Andrea is the eldest of Caroline‘s four children, his father is the late Stefano Casiraghi, who died in a speedboat crash in 1990. Until such time as his uncle has an heir he is second in line to the throne, so there will be considerable fanfare.

The bride hails from one of Colombia‘s wealthiest families, whose staggering $6 Billion fortune was amassed by her grandfather, the late magnate Julio Mario Santo Domingo.

Tatiana is the daughter of the late Julio Santo Domingo, named by Forbes in 2011 as the second richest man in Colombia, and Vera Rechulski, a Brazilian Socialite from Sao Paolo currently living in Paris.

In 1999, Prince Andrea was on PEOPLE magazine’s ‘50 Most Beautiful People.’ Four years later, he was voted the ‘Most Stylish Royal Man‘ by readers of Hello magazine, and in 2008, Forbes placed him tenth on its ‘20 Hottest Young Royals‘ list.

The Monaco princes’ lives are not without recent controversy.

Last December, Andrea was stopped by police for speeding at 170 mph. His Audi 6 was immobilized, his driving license seized and he had to return to Paris by train.

In February, this year his younger brother Pierre Casiraghi, 24, allegedly got into a fight with a stranger at the exclusive Double Seven club in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District because he was ‘jealous’ of him. Prince Pierre was punched and sent flying into a table on the other side of the room, landing with blood pouring from his face. ‘Pierre’s face looked broken, with deep cuts and blood everywhere,’ said one witness. ‘He looked like he needed plastic surgery.’

The French media have dubbed Andrea as an ‘enfant terrible‘ and the ‘angel rebel.’